And, so I dared to dream
by The 483
Summary: A refitting station in a distant system is found infested with a new hostile alien race a mere year after the Red Harvest fleet is defeted in Human space, and the Nirvana is at the for front of this new struggle!
1. If it was your last day?

Astronomy Domain

…**And, so I dared to dream…**

Ah, yet another attempt to broach head first into something I sometimes actually think I do a decent job at.(I don't own this show or it's shwag.)

**#1 If it was your last day?**

"This is the carrier _Monastery_ requesting an approach vector to dock at the orbiting station _Faded Glory_." The boxy craft engine cones dulled while its request was relayed to the plate shaped refitting station. After a minute, the bridge com set burped a dollop of static, and then an authoritive voice answered their query.

"Sorry, _Monastery_, we are unable to handle a ship of your class at this facility. Keep moving at vector 1.2.65 in system and you can dock directly at base."

"Alright, thank you much, _Glory_, _Monastery_ out." The ships twin engines flared and the beat up carrier accelerated in system. Just as expected, all the sensors on the station followed the departing carrier, unable to pierce the thick hull plates. The station therefore missed the small, beetle shaped ship carrying a large box float out from the nearby moon and drift toward the station.

The cockpit was dark, the only illumination coming from the instrument panel. Every now and then, some of the light would glint of what looked like a small metal wand floating in the air.

"Why the hell can't we just blast the damn thing out of the sky?" A male voice floated angrily in the dark. It was another male voice that answered.

"You heard the reply from the station. There is at least one man left alive, and if there is any chance we can save him, or them, we have to try." The voice was calm and sexy, oozing confidence. Silence followed, as the approached the dish shaped station, and continued until they were hovering precisely 5 feet over the hull above what the schematics had labeled storage.

"Alright people this is it, once we make contact you will have 10 to make your way through the station, and take the main control room before they are able to launch the message torpedoes and call the rest of the fleet. As soon as connection is established I'm going to barrage their sensor array with missile. Strap in to your launch tubes, you drop in 2." As she finished, a dim red light filled the cabin, and a room full of monsters drooped down a ladder and got set to rain hell on their enemies.

The sensors had just began to cycle back to scan out, when there was a slight tremor, and then the entire sensor node was nothing but black, ragged edged crater. In the storage area 8 orange rimed holes were burned in the ceiling and 8 EVA suited monsters dropped in and spread quickly throughout the station in teams of two. Four minutes later, the first to reach central control reported in.

"The damned bulkhead is sealed!" he yelled.

"Which one?" Gascogne asked, knowing who spoke, by voice, although there was a pop up indicator with vitals. She was watching the timer and able to provide map support.

"The north." Dita answered for him, being on the same search team. The com frequency they were used was squad, and the other six members of the search squad could here it too.

"Jura here, the west one is sealed to."

"No contact as of yet." Barnette added. The others confirmed the same. No humans or otherwise.

"Parfait and Duerro are headed to engineering to bypass, shift around and see if you can find anything, Acknowledge."

"Rodger!" the chorus of voices answered, followed by silence as the troopers followed the prepared plans. Gasco wasn't worried; she never worried, but was a little unnerved. Everything went according to plan, but where were they, the people should have been there, angry that their sensors were greased, or that there were eight large hole that needed to be sealed. But the main control room sealed and no response from the person or people inside? And if the station had been taken, where were they? Was this the case of a renegade? But there would still be signs struggle, or some left behind. They couldn't do any more than mimic voices without a human, but there hadn't been any mention of another earthling since the assault on Mejale and Tarak, and that was over a year ago. Meia echoed her thoughts as soon as Gasco finished thinking them.

"Something's wrong here, Miss Gasco." Mostly, Gasco did not let anyone refer to her as anything other than Gascogne, and would jump to correct them, but Meia was a different story, and she didn't even notice the breech. "There's nothing here, no signs of struggle, blood, bullet dimples or casings. There aren't even the regular signs of life that normally are around an active ship, much less a station of this classification."

"What do you think, Meia?" Gascogne asked.

"I don't know, but I don't like it. I popped my mask and tried to place it. The air smells stale, Gasco, not recycled stale, but empty, musty. Dead. There hasn't been anyone human here in a long time."

"Thanks for the info, Meia." Gasco knew she could count on Meia to get situational analysis that no one else would pick up. "Switch to the team freq and let them know what's up, then see if you can crack into the command center and find out what sent that message."

"Rodger." Then she switched freq sans spread the word, while Gasco started digging through past shipping records in this system. The mission timer was at 04:43. At 2:45 Meia was report of the all hands freq.

"Meia here, explosive placed and ready to detonate. Blowing the lock in 5…"

"AHHH, what is that thing!"

"Crap there's more than one, what the hell are they!"

"Report! Whats going on…AHHH"

"Dita! Dita!"

"AHHH help me! Mister Alien!"

"ALL TEAMS, OPEN FIRE AND FALL BACK TO THE CENTRAL CONTROL, ON THE BOUNCE!"

"What's happening down there?" Gasco yelled into the gunfire."

"ALL TEAMS, OPEN FIRE AND FALL BACK TO THE CENTRAL CONTROL, ON THE BOUNCE!" Meia shouted on the all hands, already leveling here assault weapon as the first new horror crawled across the wall and around the corner. She let loose a three round burst, watched the monstrosity absorb the metal shredding bullets. She logged it and filed it away, even as she loosed longer bursts into it. It jumped to the floor and finally collapsed as her weapon cycled empty. She heard Misty gasp about the same time as she heard the gas seal on the door behind her. She grabbed Misty's arm and ran past the monster she had just killed, slowing to confirm to herself what was behind the control door.

"Contacts, Everywhere, but they're not Harvest!" Someone shouted and Meia immediately jumped in.

"All teams, 86 that order and fall back to the storage area for extraction. Any units needing pickup report now."

"Jura and Barnette already at extraction, area secure."

"Duerro and parfait, en route."

"Hibiki in the mess hall, Dita is down, require pickup!"

"Rodger, Meia and Misty on the way. Everyone else, head for extraction and hold." She signed off and herself and Misty made their way to the mess hall. Dita was laying on her back, the front of her suit was shredded, but there was no visible injury, but she wasn't responding to anything. Hibiki humped her up on his back, and fireman carried her, with Misty and Meia providing cover to extraction. As the reached the final hall, there were heaps of the monster bodies all over. At the final stretch, Meia broke of, kicked a body over, put one round between it's upper pair of eyes, grabbed the metal on it's back, and dragged it for pickup. Jura and Barnette covered the rests, and were the last to be recovered. There was a small gout of venting atmosphere and bodies until the bulkhead sealed. Hibiki placed the still inert Dita down, and strapped her down on the acceleration couch, before doing the same to himself.

"Gasco to Nirvana, Grease the bastards, we're clear." She fired the jets toward the moon, as dozens of light blue lasers arced through space, penetrating an equal number of places. The station detonated in a giant fireball whose shockwave buffeted the beetle shaped shuttle as it departed, returning home.

Well, that's it for chapter one, let me know what you think, please! (And on Pirate Fleet! I really tried at that one!)


	2. What Is the annatomy of horror?

…**And, so I dared to dream…**

Ah, yet another attempt to broach head first into something I sometimes actually think I do a decent job at. (I don't own this show or it's shwag.)

**#2 What is the anatomy of horror?**

The hospital wing of the Nirvana was occupied by three people, although only one of them needed medical attention. Dita lay in the bed; the two deep slashes across her stomach were stitched up and smeared with medi-gel, then bandaged up. Hibiki was asleep in a chair next to her bed, he hadn't left her side since they'd returned, and swore he wouldn't till she regained consciousness, so as long as he stayed out of the way, Duerro simply ignored him. He checked her vitals, and satisfied that she would remain that way, left to attend to his next task. He walked over to the door marked "SEALED ENVIORNMET." As he got within a few feet of the door a switch cover slid automatically out of the way. He punched his code in, and the door irised out of the way. He washed his hands, and pulled a pair of gloves out of a wall receptacle. He walked up to a floor length steel cabinet, and punched another code into a recessed numerical pad. A lock clicked, and he pulled open the door, and grabbed a large satchel out of it. He walked to another door, and dialed it open, and stepped through. There was a full length glass window next to a door marked with the biohazard cross, and a bank of recording equipment. He flicked on the equipment, and then thumbed a switch on the belt pack for his boom mic. He cleared his throat, saw it register on a computer, and then stepped through the final door.

"Doctor Duello Mcfile reporting for autopsy of unknown hostile recovered from station _Faded Glory_." Duello walked to the table, which adjusted itself to the perfect examine height for Duello, and a tray table scooted up and relived him of the satchel. Tiny hydraulic powered arms flipped up from under the tray and unrolled the satchel, revealing a long roll of shiny tools. As Duello grabbed the zipper on the bright orange haz-mat bag, three arms mounted spot lights popped on and adjusted to provide the best light angle. After the bag was fully unzipped and folded down, an arm with what looked like a black light wand began prowling back and forth over the corpse.

"Exterior of the creature," Duello began to pull measurements and readings with tools closest to him, "is what appears to be a human torso. No legs or arms, or superficial signs of either. Face seems human, lacking any visible signs of nasal cavities, regular set of eyes, with a second set, which appear to be mechanical in nature. Length at 2 feet 71/2 inches from roof of skull to base of spine, weighed at… 130 pounds total mass. Dual cylinders of a yet unidentified metal seemed to be fused to the back." A small beep sounded, and screens against the wall to his left clicked on. They showed silhouettes of different areas of the creature.

"X-ray scans appear to be unable to penetrate the outer layer of the creature, Beginning autopsy." Duello dropped the two tools he had been using into the incineration bin. He reached over and the tray handed him a thermometer and what looked like a blue stick with a small screen on it. He slid the thermometer into the abdomen, and stabbed the chest with the other device.

"The outer shell of the creature is composed of… human skin, with amounts of an unknown element that seems to match the composition of the metal components attached to the back. Internal temperature is listed as…75 degrees." He discarded those tools, and grabbed the scalpel. He split the skin from top of the skull, down the smooth face, down to the base of the spine.

"Outer layer of…skin, is under layered with a thin sheet of metal. Interior contains… a human skeleton, minus aforementioned appendages. This structure is made of bone, all major organs are accounted for…hmmm, this is peculiar, this creature appears to have had its appendix removed surgically." Duello looked thoughtful for a second, then grabbed a thing, stabbed a kidney, and placed it in a receptacle, closed it, and pressed a button. "Piaway, test this sample for me, please." He got an okay, and dialed another channel. "Miss Gascogne, could you send a tech to med bay 3 for assistance, please?"

"No problem." Was all she said, to him. She turned and yelled at someone off camera as the feed dropped. 4 Minutes later a man in a black cloak cycled into the sterile room, hands buried in metal gauntlets.

"What's up, Doc, needed another set of graspers?" He said, eyeing the corpse.

"Yes," he said in his usual tone, "take a look in there, and tell me what you think you see." He gestured to the exam table. The tech raised his eyebrow, but walked over to the table. He looked in without obvious surprise.

"Looks like someone shoved a robot up some guy's ass." He said simply after a moment's hesitation. When the doctor did not reply the tech sighed, and made a full analysis.

"Okay, as you can see, there are some kind of appendages tucked behind the organs of the stomach region. They seem to be mirroring the ones folded over and then into the rib cage." He worked around for a minute, and when he was done, thin metal arms and legs, dominated by multi jointed razor sharp appendages. "Now, as you can see, these are directly attached to the spine, which is completely composed of metal. When we examine the skull, we see that the top of the skull, and most of the face are bone, yet the upper jaw, lower jaw and base of the skull are metallic." He looked smug, as he continued, "So I'd say we've got ourselves a cyborg, and a very advanced one, at that. The whole thing looks brand new, how was it killed?" Duello was entering the info into a terminal. He answered without turning.

"It was shot with a whole clip of metal shredding rounds, with a single side arm round between the secondary eyes."

"Hmm, there isn't a scratch on a single surface. The organic layers must have absorbed all off the trauma, but there isn't a mark on the forehead at all."

"Okay… well, seal that up; we've got to go report to the captain." The tech nodded, and zipped up the bag, and the both left the sterile room, and into the prep room. As Duello stripped his gloves, a small beep sounded and a light blinked on a console. He walked up, typed a few strokes, and waited while data pooled onto the screen. The Tech walked over and gazed at the screen as well.

"Looks like your correct about the creature being a cyborg, DNA match to human."

"Hmm, well, that's something… let's run it against the crew roster of the _Glory_ and see who our violent friend is, scoot over." He elbowed the doctor gently out of the way, and a flurry of keystrokes later, looked surprised and stood back. "Hmm, looks like someone _did_ shove a robot up his ass. Any further discussion was rendered nil as the lights popped off, and intercom started blaring an alarm.

"Warning! Multiple hull attachments! Inbound hostiles matching the description of those found aboard the _Faded Glory!_ All hands report to battle stations, all other available personnel gear up and prepare to repel boarders! Most likely initial breaches estimated on decks C, D, and F, sections 5, 12, and 38, EVA gear required in all adjacent sections!" The doctor turned to exit, and thumbed the lock release to no effect. He then remembered that directly after a ship wide alert, that most digital doors would not open, because incase of a breach, it allowed bulkhead doors to seal and atmosphere to be stabilized. There was a taping noise of metal against glass, and Duello turned.

"Why are you tapping on the window?"

"I'm not…" the tech's reply was chopped of as the wind shattered into thousands of pieces, and a child sized body landed in the center of the room, balanced on eight thin metal legs popping out from it's back. It reared back, so it's spine base was near the floor, and skeletal pair of thin metal poles sprouted from where legs and arms were supposed to be. Large clusters at the end of the poles sprung open into four razor edged "fingers." The creature's movements became jerky as eight flashes strobed the darkness and red as the tech emptied his side arm into the creature. The thing was stunned, but still "standing," until a small click and another eight flares dropped it to the ground, and a flurry of booted stomps to the cranium stopped it's movement. A second later the lights clicked on, and Duello raised his eyebrow at the tech.

"Yep, the Colt 1911 pistol, one of my personal favorites." The doctor continued to stare. "What? That impatient gal isn't the only one who enjoys classic weapons." The doctor was still not satisfied. The tech sighed, "I was a lieutenant in the Taraak Combat engineers."

"Good, then your with me to help with the wounded."

"Oh, ok doc, no problem, what first?" He unslung another weapon from beneath his cloak. "And now, presenting the Heckler and Koch Mp 5. Let's heal us some people." He yanked the charging lever and smiled in anticipation.


	3. Borders in our cord'ers

…**And, so I dared to dream…**

Ah, yet another attempt to broach head first into something I sometimes actually think I do a decent job at. (I don't own this show or it's shwag.)

**#3 Borders in out cord'ers!**

_Clack clack clack, clack clack clack, clack clack clack!_ The muzzle flashes from the tech's sub-machine gun added a sharp counterpoint to the harsh red lights strobing in the corridor as he popped up from the makeshift barricade to drop another "Strider." They were being called that due to the odd, slender metal stilts that sprouted from their backs and allowed almost limitless mobility. Luckily, the invaders focused on the rear of the ship, around the main engine, and medical was located just aft of the garden, which was at the foremost section of the central deck. The barricade was posted just before the door and being besieged by a slowly advancing wave of bodies. It seemed as if the piles got closer with each evacuee from the rear potion of the ship. The tech and a blonde male officer continued to pour fire onto anything that moved that wasn't marked with a green FOF (Friend or foe) id tag.

Meanwhile, a deck above, the crew was discussing how to repulse the invaders, while merely complained about what felt like being attacked by thousands of ants he couldn't swat. The discussion was being held by the original leadership group, Captain Vivan, Commander Buzam, Crew Chief Gascogne, and Dread team leader Meia. But, there had been some new editions to the command structure since the defeat of the Red Harvest Fleet. After their victory, the less hostile governments of Mejale and Tarak had come up with an idea to see if the years of prejudice between the two powers could over come. They organized an experiment in which a mixed crew of men and women would traverse other sectors of the galaxy to attempt peaceful contact with foreign powers. Other groups were dispatched to hunt down the remnants the Red Harvest fleet, and find out what other threats awaited in the void. The Nirvana had had been restocked, new crew added, and sent on a special mission, given its record of success against the Harvest. She was crewed with the original crew, plus a selection of men from Tarak, chosen to fill requests from the captain and B.C. Well, it appeared that they had found one of these new threats.

With the four leaders, Rebecca, who had accompanied them this time in order to be closer to Ezra and Kalua, was in command of the Dreads B-team. Captain John Malcolm, who was the head of garrison of vanguards placed in the Nirvana. They all stood and argued about what to do, as the remainder of the bridge and engineering crew read damage reports, and did what they could to stabilize the ship. B.C. yelled into a boom mic, "Bart, accelerate away, toward the planet, lest more board."

"Aye, aye… Commander." Bart said, turning in his tank while scratching dozens of angry red welts that covered his arms and lower back. The ship responded, pivoting on it's tail and shooting away.

The flow of people had slackened in the last few minutes, and they were beginning to push the striders back. A series of what the tech recognized as pistol shots echoed from the occupied sector. He found this strange, being no men in that portion of the ship, and women preferred light based weapon systems. He was mildly surprised when an attractive green haired woman ran toward him, firing an M9 Pistol at her pursuers. Her clip ran dry, and a look of surprise filled her violet eyes as she fell face forward onto the deck, a strider affixed to her back. The tech took 3 steps forward, drawing his Colt sidearm, and fired 3 shots at point blank into the things face. It tumbled of and into another pile as she rolled over onto her back, and stared at the gauntleted hand offered to her. She grabbed it, stood, and then slapped the hand away.

"Don't touch me." She said in an almost neutral voice, and stalked of, dusting her self off. It was an improvement, for Barnette at least, as he fire band of disgust at men had lessened as of late. The tech just smiled and shook his head, the sheer hypocritical effrontery of women was predictable, but never short of amazing. He was not surprised though, as he was born off of Tarak, on a planet where men and women lived together, and moved to Tarak at a later time. A speaker on the wall burped static and Belvederes voice gave him and the blond the all clear.

"Barnette was the last one, you are clear to retreat."

"All right, Vinn, you heard the woman." He gave a formal bow with outstretched hand pointing at the door. "Ladies first." The blonde, Vinn, gave him the one finger salute, and walked through the door. The tech reached into an inside pocket of his cloak, and tossed out a couple of flat discs, which were actually a type of mine that gave of a burst of energy that wouldn't rupture the hull. He walked through the door, and sealed it behind him.

"Captain!" Celtic called in astonishment, "All contacts appear to be retreating to the rear of the ship, where the tightest clustering of entry points."

"Could they be retreating?" B.C. asked of no one at all. But, almost as if in response to her words, the ship shuddered, and Bart let out a yelp.

"Captain!" this time it was Amarone, "the enemies are all assaulting the engines… from the outside! Approximately 80% of the enemies have left the ship to assault the engine!" The Captain closed her eyes, and made a snap decision.

"Bart! Head into the atmosphere, we'll try and burn em off, full power!" He gave an Aye, and the ship shuddered again as it began to accelerate. She turned, and addressed the rest. "Meia, Rebecca, get with the rest of the Dread teams, and the Vanguard, and form up strike teams to try and push the rest off the ship." Meia nodded, and walked with off with Rebecca to where the dread pilots were gathered, with John tailing behind.

Rebecca, grab Velour and organize a couple of teams, you're on the left wing. I'm going to take Malcolm and handle the right with the Vanguard pilots."

"Right Meia." She replied, and set of at a brisker walk, gathered Velour up by eye, and headed to the grouping of Dread pilots. Meia noticed with a slight smirk that the Dread crew and the Vanguard crews stood in the same area, but the men and women were still keeping a… healthy distance from each other. She was slightly astounded because of after only a few weeks of practice they had joined into a seamless fighting force, but outside of that, were, well, aliens. She opened her mouth to speak, but a loud boom and the entire ship shook violently. It didn't stop shaking.

"Bart! What the hell are you doing in there?" Magno yelled, to which Bart replied with the expected indignity and sacredness.

"It wasn't me, the main engine just blew out, and we hit the atmosphere. With the main drive gone, I'm not going to be able to break the planets gravity." Magno's eyes widened, then a look of determination flitted across her face. "Ok, then." She raised her voice, "ok, every body to emergency stations!" She strolled to her chair, and spoke over the inter-ship intercom. "We are about to make an emergency crash landing on the planet. All crew, batten down every thing you can, the strap yourselves in. It's going to be a rough ride." She looked over the bridge crew as everyone in the garden area secured what they could. "Ezra, status report."

"Engine power down to 35%, fires in the engine deck, Dread platform, and engineering spaces."

"Ok, Amarone what's the situation with our guests?" Magno continued down the line.

"There are approximately 50 contacts still aboard the ship, and so far 70% of the enemies on the exterior of the ship have been burned off from planet entry. No further contacts inbound."

"Alright, so at least that part worked. Celtic, will she hold together in the crash?" Celtic was quiet for a minute, looking over her screens.

"Well, best projections show that as long as we don't tumble and roll upon landing, the super structure should together in impact."

"Bart, this will mean that you'll have to stay in there the entire…"

No problem captain, I'll guide her in to a four star landing, just buckle your harness and leave it up to me. Girls, transfer all thruster controls to me, and let me know when everyone's ready." He glance at the new read outs and displays that popped into existence inside of his tank. Working quickly, he dragged them to a better position, and set up a thrust program. A few seconds after he finished running the test sim, the all clear came through. "All right, Paexis, lets do this." The walls shimmered in response, and seemed to settle in a steely resolve. He punched the accept key for the programmed thrust codes, the ship pivoted on its axis, the flipped over, righting the ship in relation to the planet's surface. The ship fell toward the planets ocean. Bart popped open the air flaps, and violent deceleration shook the ship, and alarms started bleating in his tank. He pushed the nose down, and the bottom section of the ship enterer the water. It skipped of the surface, and using downward thrusters, held the bottom underwater. Even with all of that, they were approaching the coastal cliffs at to great a speed. His readouts told him that he had only enough juice left for one firing of the thrusters, so he need something to keep him upright once the thrust was spent. He typed in a quick flurry of commands, and a wall of energy beams sliced fro the top part of the ship. Each line impacted the face of the approaching cliff, smashing the rock into smaller chunks. As soon as the energy was clear, he fired all reverse thrusters, and activated just the aft half of the shield. As he expected, in atmosphere, this half dome acted like a luminous parachute, which slowed them further. But, the strain of the lifesaving maneuver caused too much stress to the shield generator, and the machine exploded. Bart felt a sharp blow to the back of his head, and was mercifully blacked out when the ship impacted the crumbling cliff face.


End file.
